Once again, instead of listening to the genuine concerns of people, government ministers are choosing to spin these concerns in to claims of left wing extremists taking over two highly respected national charities.
Unfortunately, the organisations being accused,the Council for the Protection of Rural England and the National Trust, are ringing alarm bells, but without offering any suggestions on how to resolve the housing shortage. They could of course argue that their role isn’t to fill the void left by the scrapping of all national strategic planning guidance. However, given impending chaos that is about to befall the planning system, with the implementation of the National Planning Policy Framework, they should seriously reconsider their purist approach to our land use policies. Simply saying no, no, no is unlikely to achieve anything other than the government response experienced to date.
If these organisations believe that the areas of green belt currently being targeted for development are the wrong ones, then let them come up with some genuinely sustainable alternatives. Given the very real shortage of housing in this country, continuing to say no to everything, is simply not an option and just helps to make the government’s case for them.
Roger Gambba-Jones 